7 GREEK AND MODERN MECHANISTIC PHILOSOPHERS - PHILOSOPHY - 2025

For mechanistic philosophers, all reality is shaped like a machine. In this sense, the universe can be understood by the concepts of matter and motion, and it can be explained mechanically.

Mechanism is a philosophical current that affirms that everything has a mechanical origin, that is, it is produced by a mechanical force. Some of the representatives of this current are Anaxagoras, Empedocles, Francis Bacon or John Locke.

Greek Mechanistic Philosophers

The mechanistic philosophers of Ancient Greece affirm a single origin of all things. For them, reality is made up of numerous fundamental principles that move mechanically.

This mechanical movement, in turn, has a pre-established order of succession and arrangement of the particles.

The three most representative Greek philosophers of this current are: Anaxagoras, Empedocles, and Democritus.

1- Anaxagoras of Clazómenas (499-428 BC)

Anaxagoras is a pre-Socratic philosopher, born in Clazómenas, now Turkey. Anaxagoras moves to Greece where he is part of the Ionian school, although he is always considered a foreigner.

This philosopher postulates that the principle of all things is the nous, understood as thought.

Anaxagoras affirms that things originate from an infinite number of elements combined. The mind or nous is the one that gives anticipated order to these elements as a mechanical force.

In this sense, knowledge is what gives rise to everything. Anaxagoras is the counterpart of Democritus, since he supports a conception of mental or contemplative life, as opposed to a vision of practical life of the latter.

2- Empedocles of Agrigento (492-432 BC)

Born in Agrigento, Italy, Empedocles postulates that everything is made up of four elements: earth, water, air and fire.

Each element itself consists of particles that, when mixed, form all things. The four mentioned have constituted since the Neolithic units already individualized in the practice of popular physics of cultures.

3- Democritus of Abdera (460-370 BC)

Born in Abder, Democritus is a Greek philosopher whose teacher is Leucippus, founder of the atomist theory.

Following this line of thought, Democritus maintains that things are made up of an infinite number of dense, eternal atoms and an infinite external variety of forms.

For example, for Democritus, souls are made up of subtle and rapid atoms of fire, spherical in shape.

Things are constituted by the mechanical effects of pressure and the impact of atoms, which are tiny particles.

Modern Mechanistic Philosophers

From the Middle Ages, mechanical discoveries began to gain ground to solve daily problems of populations.

From the 14th and 15th centuries, war and epidemics decrease the workforce, so it is necessary to resort to mechanization as a way to make up for the lack of workforce.

In this sense, at that time, mechanics ceased to be a minor and ignoble profession, to stand out as a possibility of progress and survival.

In the seventeenth century, the ideal of machine takes its true force with the work of modern philosophers on mechanism.

4- Francis Bacon (1561-1626)

Francis Bacon is a London-born English philosopher and politician, considered the father of empiricism. This English philosopher sees the stagnation of the philosophy of his time, but highlights the mechanics is in full swing and developing by leaps and bounds.

In this sense, Bacon understands that philosophy must leave the merely contemplative scene, to unite contemplation with action.

Bacon, as Descartes will later do, fails to differentiate the natural from the artificial. The philosopher postulates that what man does with mechanics is to produce phenomena by uniting natural causes with the hand of man.

5- René Descartes (1596-1650)

René Descartes is a French-born mathematical and physical philosopher. Descartes is a fervent defender of the mechanical arts, as ways to improve human existence.

In Cartesian philosophy, the view is made explicit that the sciences and the mechanical arts should not be separated to produce knowledge.

The French philosopher affirms that the machines built and the bodies created by nature work under the same principles and logic. In this sense, Descartes is concerned with the mathematical description of nature.

6- Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679)

Thomas Hobbes is a political philosopher, born in England, famous for his theories on monarchical absolutism and the publication of his renowned work "Leviathan."

Hobbes uses the mechanical method typical of his time to explain the nature of man and the phenomena that derive from him, such as civil society and the State. Mechanism reduces nature to the immovable principles of mechanics.

In this sense, Hobbes tries to explain social phenomena, applying the deductive method, where starting from certain premises it is impossible to deny the validated conclusions.

Hobbes's fixation is to discover the causes of social phenomena through the mechanistic analysis of human nature. Science in Hobbesian thought is an analysis of variables of the nature of man.

7- John Locke (1632-1704)

John Locke is an English philosopher and physician, known as the father of Classical Liberalism. Locke follows the ideas of Francis Bacon and is considered one of the first English empiricists.

The mechanistic account of the relationship between subject and object continues with John Locke. For this philosopher, this relationship is mechanical and, therefore, can be studied through the empirical method.

This methodology is based on analyzing the facts. In empiricism, all knowledge derives from experience, that is, from practice.

These postulates are those that support the mechanistic doctrine of the seventeenth century, which also takes up Greek atomism to affirm that everything is composed of atoms.

The latter are the ones that generate the experience of man, which later becomes knowledge.

References

1. Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) - dle.rae.es.
2. Well, Gustavo. Pre-Socratic Metaphysics. Editorial Pentalfa. Oviedo, Spain, 1974. Recovered at: fgbueno.es.
3. Laguna, Rogelio. From machine to mechanism. Brief History of the Construction of an Explanatory Paradigm. Colombian Journal of Philosophy of Science, 2016. Retrieved from: academia.edu.
4. González, Alfredo. Mechanism in Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan. Recovered at: holegon.net
5. John Locke. Recovered at Bibliotecadigital.ilce.edu.mx.